Ability to draw multiple lines of a specific length.

[wanderson]

Is there any way that a tool that would allow you to draw multiple lines or even walls of a specific length one after the other without having to click in and out of the Object Length box before you draw each line could be introduced?

In AutoCAD the command prompt bar allows you to just point mouse/type distance/ click mouse......point mouse/type distance/ click mouse...... and so on. It's a pretty fluid way to enter measured survey info whereas the currrent VectorWorks method (unless I've missed something) seems pretty cumbersome and slow.

[ 06-03-2005, 07:26 AM: Message edited by: wanderson-4 ]

[mike m oz]

Use the Mode Bar - hit the tab key 3 times to take you to the 'L' field and input your value and then hit enter.

Preempting your next comment - yes it would be more logical to have the 'L' field first - we just have to live with that one unfortunately.

[wanderson]

That seems to help matters a little. Cheers for that.

[jan15]

If you ever draw anything that's orthogonal, you can use the first field for left-to-right lines and the second field for up-and-down lines. The reason why the X and Y fields are first is that most of us draw more orthogonal things than anything else.

Also, Vectorworks is much better than Autocad at drawing and editing polylines, so it helps to draw rectangles instead of lines, drawing only one vector instead of four, and using both the X and Y field instead of only one or the other, and then Add or Clip Surface to combine them into more complex polylines.

To further speed up the process, consider mousing with your left hand so you can enter data on the numeric keypad at the same time with your right. Use the keypad Enter key instead of the Tab key to skip through data fields you don't want. You can enter numeric data much faster on the keypad, and without looking at the keyboard, as any accountant can tell you.